Review of the film Titane: The film stars Agathe Rouselle as a serial killer mechanophilia and won the Palme d’Or at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival.
Titane movie
Titane tells the storey of a serial killer who becomes pregnant after having sex with an automobile. Julia Ducournau, a French writer-director, has made her second feature picture, and I find her to be a very sympathetic filmmaker. Titane won the Palme d’Or at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival, apparently shocking and repulsing the crowd. Her previous picture, Raw, had experienced the same fate (2016). After you get beyond the strangeness, you’ll find her films to be warm and sensitive stories of people trying to figure themselves out.
Ducournau’s coming-of-age films depict heroines battling with their evolving wants and changing bodies behind the sensationalist trappings of body horror. Junior (2011) is a short film about a young girl who sheds skin like a snake. Ducournau uses this as a metaphor for puberty. Raw, her debut film, appears to be about the young heroine’s increasing appetite for human flesh. It is, however, about her developing sexuality. Titane, which is finally available in India on Mubi, is no exception.
Alexia has always been interested in automobiles. After Alexia (Adèle Guigue) suffers a head injury in a vehicle accident, surgeons place a titanium plate in her skull. (Titane is a French word that means “titanium.”) Alexia, who had been cheerful in the car before it crashed, suddenly appears icy and inexpressive during the surgery, predicting the emotional detachment that will define her as an adult. After the procedure, the first thing she does when she gets out of the hospital is hug and kiss her automobile. Buckle up, we’re about to enter Ducournau territory. Alexia, the adult version, is a showgirl, played by Agathe Rouselle, a 33-year-old model and first-time actor. Ducournao describes her as groaning and rubbing herself against a muscle automobile in his introduction. She mock-humps the automobile as she looks into the camera at the end of the sexy dance. We get a glimpse of her homicidal side a few minutes later.
